Mexico has waded into a legal challenge to a new immigration law in the US state of Arizona.

In papers submitted to a US federal court, the Mexican government argues that the law is unconstitutional and would damage bilateral relations.
It says it is concerned that it could lead to unlawful discrimination against Mexican citizens.

The law - which comes into force on 29 July - makes it a state crime to be in Arizona without immigration papers.

It also requires police to question people about their immigration status, if officers suspect the person is in the US illegally, and if they have stopped them for a legitimate reason.

The Mexican government submitted arguments as a "friend of the court", or amicus curiae, meaning it is not a party to the case, but is offering a legal opinion which it believes has bearing on it.

It is in support of a case brought by a group of civil rights organisations, including the Mexican American Legal Defense and Education Fund, the National Immigration Law Center, and the American Civil Liberties Union.

'Discriminatory acts' It urges the federal court in Arizona to declare the law unconstitutional and stop it coming into effect.

"Mexico has a duty to protect its citizens and ensure that their ethnic origin is not used as a basis for committing discriminatory acts," the Mexican foreign ministry said in a statement.

Arizona's governor says the border is not secure It said it would respond forcefully to any violation of the fundamental human rights of all Mexicans in Arizona, independent of their immigration status.

The action is one of five separate challenges to the Arizona immigration law.
The measure has widespread support in Arizona, where there is growing concern at the flow of illegal migrants across the border from Mexico.

Arizona governor Jan Brewer has said she was forced to act because the federal government had failed to tackle illegal immigration.

Other states are considering similar moves.

President Barack Obama has called the law misguided.

He has made immigration reform a priority, amid pressure from US border states for action to help curb illegal immigration and drug violence.

Last month, he said he would seek more funding and deploy up to 1,200 extra troops to help secure the US-Mexico border.

I don't think they can. This story sounds like a lot of BS. Besides any lawyer worth their salt would wipe the floor with Mexico. All one has to do is reveal Mexico's own immigration policy, which makes the Arizona law look like a walk in the park.

Stalked by kidnappers, murders, rapists and corrupt officials, the journey Central Americans make through Mexico on their way to the United States is one of the most perilous migration routes in the world.

Every year tens of thousands of desperately poor Guatemalans, Salvadorans, Nicaraguans and Hondurans cross over Mexico's southern border and head north. In the last few years this journey, while never risk-free, has become a horror show.

According to an Amnesty International report the biggest fear used to be violent robberies by young gangs; today it is abductions by organised criminals. Many claim to belong to the notorious Zetas drug trafficking organisation, although the report points out that the gangs could be appropriating the cartel's bloody reputation for its fear value.Typically migrants are held in safe houses until relatives already in the US, or back home, raise ransoms for their freedom. Torture is common, and survivors have recounted seeing others murdered before their eyes when the cash has not arrived. "Migrants in Mexico are facing a major human rights crisis leaving them with virtually no access to justice, fearing reprisals and deportation if they complain of abuses," said Rupert Knox, author of the report.

The Amnesty report draws on a National Human Rights Commission investigation that estimated about 10,000 migrants were kidnapped in Mexico over a six-month period last year. Even when these cases are reported to the authorities, a serious investigation is almost unheard of. Murders and disappearances of migrants are similarly forgotten.

Most information in both reports comes from interviews in church-run shelters where migrants feel safe enough to talk about their ordeals, which include sexual violence estimated to affect six out of 10 female migrants. Rape is so common that some people smugglers who guide Central Americans through Mexico reportedly advise women to have contraceptive injections before starting the journey. Abused migrants have also learned by experience to distrust the authorities. Most incidents of kidnapping cited in the reports involved some degree of official complicity, and many migrants are also subjected to direct official abuse. Last week a train laden with Central Americans was stopped by masked federal police in the southern state of Oaxaca. "They came shooting their guns, got us off the train, beat us, forced us to lie on the floor and put their boots on people's heads," Guatemalan migrant Martha Chilel, 21, said in a phone interview from a shelter. "They took all our money, and they fondled the women. Then they told us to run."

But the experience had not dented her determination to continue northwards with her husband. She said the couple had borrowed money to make the trip that they could only pay back if they got work in the US. "In theory the dangers should deter migrants but in practice they keep coming," said Leticia Gutierrez, a nun who works with shelters across the country. "The poverty they are running from is so desperate they are willing to risk everything."

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